Get ISIS before they get us

Militants from the Islamic State parade in a commandeered Iraqi security forces armored vehicle on a main street in Mosul, Iraq. (Uncredited/AP)

Armed with automatic rifles, high-capacity magazines, hand grenades and suicide-bomb vests, eight men in three teams recite their prayers and start their operation — not in Paris but in New York City.

Three men emerge from cars around three sides of Grand Central Terminal during rush hour. One enters on Lexington, one on 42nd St., one on Vanderbilt. They stride forward firing at the hundreds of people trapped in a triangular pincer.

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Three invade St. Patrick's. It's the Christmas season. They drive a panicked throng into the sanctuary, picking people off one by one and hurling grenades as Hercules Unit cops storm the cathedral. Two gunmen take positions beside the lead car of a train stopped for passengers at the Times Square subway station. As it pulls out, they spray fire through the passing windows for the length of the train as it pulls out.

As a killing field, crowded, enclosed New York could be worse. (ANDREW BURTON/Reuters)

The bloody arithmetic of the Paris assault: 129 dead and 352 wounded in 33 minutes. As a killing field, crowded, enclosed New York could be worse. This is not scare-mongering. These are facts of life and death in a world that has allowed ISIS to metastasize into a globally lethal force.

World reacts to Paris terror attacks

It is recklessly meaningless to say that Western civilization is at war with the ideology of radical Islam, perversion of the Muslim faith. Ideologies do not behead, rape and find glory in mass murder. Human fanatics do. Only death will stop them. Only war, smartly and aggressively waged, will degrade or destroy them, as President Obama is given to fantasizing. Only robust defenses, including intensive intelligence gathering, will keep them at bay.

In just the last two weeks, before the atrocity in Paris, ISIS had executed a bombing in Beirut and, it appears certain, downed a Russian jet over Egypt. Once described by the President as the jay-vee of terrorism, the pretenders to a caliphate are gaining strength and extending their reach - hindered little by pinprick U.S. bombing in Iraq and Syria.

Only war, smartly and aggressively waged, will degrade or destroy them, as President Obama is given to fantasizing. (JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)

The air campaign's primary objectives included impoverishing ISIS by disabling oil fields that the group has seized. But the Pentagon has acknowledged that limited bombing had caused limited and reparable damage, so that ISIS oil barons have been enjoying a half-billion dollars a year of income. Which is plenty of money for mounting sophisticated assaults.

Plainly, Obama must recognize that disengaging from war in the Middle East theatre has empowered the enemy to bring the war to the West — with the U.S. in the cross-hairs. The Paris attack, the second in less than a year, must catalyze a new White House resolve to apply military force, not as payback but as a weapon in a death struggle.

Here in New York, the ease of the Paris bloodbath must put to rest overblown concerns about NYPD spying on Muslims. The accusation has been false from the start. Understanding neighborhoods based on country of origin is not spying, nor is taking the temperature of an organization and moving on.

Most recently, there has been upset that an NYPD undercover detective made contact with a Muslim student association at Brooklyn College. Nothing came of it, but later work by the same detective broke up an unrelated alleged terror plot.

The Paris attack, the second in less than a year, must catalyze a new White House resolve to apply military force. (PHILIPPE WOJAZER/REUTERS)

More plots are inevitable. Just a glance at Al Qaeda's slick Internet magazine "Inspire" brings a reader face to face with the threat. September's issue features detailed instructions for successfully carrying out an assassination mission :

"It is important to psychologically and spiritually prepare yourself before executing this operation ... So it is important for the brother to increase in worship and remembrance to what Allah has promised for the Martyr in His path."

These are facts of life and death in a world that has allowed ISIS to metastasize into a globally lethal force. (MATTHIEU ALEXANDRE/AFP/Getty Images)

And: "It is recommended to use an automatic weapon, such as a Kalishnikov, M16 or any other assault weapon. "

And: "During the assault, hand grenades are used to clear rooms in a quick and safe way for the attacker to maneuver."

Noting the difficulty of acquiring grenades, the magazine offers step-by-step instructions for building them out of readily available materials.

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The lives and well-being of Americans now hang more than ever on stepped-up, proactive vigilance, and nowhere more so than in New York. Those who complain that the very thought of police surveillance is a chilling infringement on daily life should instead focus on the cold that awaits in morgue refrigerators.